History Favors the Bold | Kanye, Jesus is King and the Power of Standing for Something

Show Notes

NOTABLE QUOTABLE – “Your success will be just a fiction if you fear friction.” – Clay Clark

Holding Your Team Accountable

Universal File Nomenclature

Group Interview

Call Recording

Following Checklists

Asking for Google Reviews

NOTABLE QUOTABLE – “There is only one way to avoid criticism: do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing.” – Aristotle

NOTABLE QUOTABLE – “Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Almost everything–all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure–these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important.” – Steve Jobs (The co-founder of Apple, the founder of NeXT and the former CEO of PIXAR)

NOTABLE QUOTABLE – “I like thinking big. If you’re going to be thinking anything, you might as well think big.” – Donald Trump (President of the United States)

Audio Transcription

Grab the duct tape and mentally prepare yourself, or yet another mind-expanding knowledge bong from America’s number one business coach, clay Clark.

All right, Jason, welcome back to another edition of the thrive time show on your radio and podcast download. How are you sir? Oh, I’m great. It’s good to be back. Well, Hey, on today’s show we’re talking about why history favors the bold Kanye. Jesus is King, his new album and the power of standing for something. So let’s take the religious aspects out of what Kanye is currently doing and Kanye West claims to have become a born again Christian. And so whether you, um, believe this to be a publicity stunt or believe this to be true, let’s just say that that’s what he’s claiming and we’ll leave it there. Right? And a lot of people are upset about, a lot of people have something to say about, uh, Jason, why do you think a lot of people were upset about it? Why, why do you think of it?

There’s a big controversy right now that mr Kanye West has decided to become a born again Christian and to release an entirely Christian album called Jesus is King. Well, being a former, what I’d call, I’m Kanye apologist, I’m that guy who’s like, Oh man, old school Kanye. That’s the man right there. Talking about the original college dropout and graduation. Everything he’s doing now is so different. But being the person who appreciates music like I do, I think it’s cool. I think it’s awesome when an artist goes off in a completely different direction, but I think people get mad because it’s not what they’re used to and it’s not what he’s quote unquote supposed to be. W what is he supposed to be in your opinion to them? He’s the braggadocious Kanye who wants to, you know, run up on stage and still somebody’s spotlight and make crazy clothing and just rap about, you know, overall ego and everything like that.

They don’t want to see him become something else. They want him to be this cookie cutter version of Kanye. Now, what if you’re a business owner and you fear conflict? And when I get, I talked about this a lot, but again, your success will always be just a fiction. If you fear friction, again, your success, your future success will always just be a fiction if you feel friction. So let’s do an example. Jason, holding your team accountable to following scripts. Why will your success be a fiction if you’re afraid of friction? If you’re afraid to hold people accountable, they’re not going to follow the script, which means that you’re not going to sell as much as you possibly could. Okay. Another example. What about insisting that your team stays organized and that all the files are saved in the right place? Why is it impossible to scale a company if you’re afraid to tell people that they have to save files your way or the highway?

Why? Why can you not be successful if you fear friction? Well, you can’t be successful in that scenario because you can’t get anything done. Like, if we didn’t have the Dropbox nomenclature and file formatting and saving systems that we do, we have a 160 clients. Like that’s a lot of passwords. That’s a lot of print pieces. That’s a lot of systems. And if you didn’t know how to find it, if everything was just, you know, one dash seven, three, four dot. P and G, well the crap does that mean? So what if I’m listening today and I fear friction and I just don’t want to ever make somebody mad. Is it possible to fire people? No. You’ve tried to, you’ve, you’ve done a great job managing the elephant in the room and all three stores. Uh, we have a policy, no cell phones in the store. [inaudible] um, after you appeared, uh, PL to somebody higher motives and you ask them nicely to not bring their phone into the store so we can be focused on our guests.

What percentage of people say, you know what? I can see your point. I won’t use my phone. 10 to 20. And so what do you have to do? You have to remind them every day and there’s friction. Oh, absolutely. Now, what about call recording? A lot of business owners try to install call recording with clarity, voice.com for quality control, recording the calls via clarity, voice.com what happens if a, you know, you fear the friction in your employee says, I don’t want to be recorded. What happens? Well then you have no idea what you know. Good old Greg is saying and he could be taking your company or stealing your customers. What about following checklists? What if you have employees that don’t want to follow checklists? Can you have success if you fear friction? Nope, I’ve been there. It’s like, Hey guys, it’s two o’clock we have to hit this checklist and then they’re shooting daggers out of there or you know, out of their eyes at you because you’re mr.

followup. But then if you don’t do it, you have no laundry and you can’t give clean towels to the customers and so it is going to cold. What about following checklists or what about getting Google reviews? Do people follow Google reviews and get in follow checklists by default? Or do you need a little bit of friction in order to turn your success into a nonfiction? But you’ve got to have that friction. I mean, success isn’t easy if it was easy, everybody to be successful. So we’re talking now about mr Kanye West who is no stranger to controversy. True. He does not fear friction. I know. That’s what I love about him. So he doesn’t fear the friction. So we’re going to cue up, this is an interview he did with us on airport and you’ve got to watch the whole thing. It’s air pool karaoke, the late show with James cordon.

Oh yeah. And he’s trying to explain to James, you know, the new music he’s putting out what it sounds like, what the feel is. And he’s on a plane. James Corden’s on a plane with Kanye asking him about his new album. Jesus is King and Connie’s traveling with his entire choir on this large, it appears to be a seven 37 so it was a really cool jet. And this is what Kanye did on late night television. By the way, on late night television. This is what he’s doing. Is it normal for pop stars to sing songs that are this blatantly Christian on late night television? Nope, not unless it’s a late Christian broadcasting service. Okay, so here we go. Probably the first all Christian performance on a late night television show in a long time. True. So here we go.

Very hungry. Yes, he’s gonna freestyle. Check this out Jake. It’s crazy. The hustlers, even the strippers to the victims of welfare food we lived in in hell. Hell, hell yeah. Now here we here we want to see the more clearly. I know he hit me with my beat. Get weird cause where the almost nearly extinct. We rappers as role models we grab, we don’t think, I ain’t hit a argue about his face. Two features. Then we hit a term 80 years into believers. I’m just trying to say the way school and he teaches that way. Kathy, he needed reasons. That’s the way I need Jesus until he ain’t go. My single dog radio needs this and they said you can rap about anything except for Jesus. That means God’s sex slides, video tape. But if I talk about God, my record won’t get played. We’ll let this take away from my spheres. And where’s your pilot take away from my ends? I know what take away from my sins. Bring the day that we can remember next time when you’re on a plane. Everybody was trained house. Gosh,

there’s no doubt about it. He’s all about his new faith, his relationship with Christ. He being born again but he’s not apologizing now. What if he tried? What would he have to do if he wanted to make this album pop friendly? What would he have to do? By the way, the number one song in the number one album in the world right now at the time we’re recording this is this album Jesus is King. Wow. How could he right now make this less controversial? He would have to make the metaphor even more of a metaphor. Cause like what you said before was really important when you said, cause I misunderstood. You said, this is probably the most blatant Christian performance on a late night show. I’m like, Oh, there’s plenty of people who have come out later on. Like, do you remember that? Um, that new middle band pod that was super heavy, everybody loved them and it turns out all of their subject matter was Christian rock and then just kind of like pulled the veil over everybody’s eyes.

That would be the only way that he’d be able to do this without getting controversial is to make an album marketed a certain way. Then you have to listen deeper to figure out what it was about. I’m just telling you, this right here is a very controversial album. Now what he’s doing is, again, he’s traveling around the country. He’s performing just straight Christian songs. There’s not, I mean, there’s nothing out there that, there’s no metaphor, no masking. What he’s saying it is literally him proclaiming a Bible verses and telling you what they mean. Let me, let me play just one more example from this interview on airport air pool karaoke. Everybody go check out this YouTube video. Just Google search, Kanye West air pool karaoke or do a YouTube search for Kanye West air pool karaoke. Here we go.

Box. Oh,

done. Every time. Every time. [inaudible] always stay on your word. [inaudible] so badly. No. So say every single day. [inaudible] so [inaudible]

think about that. I mean, what is he doing? He’s absolutely committing career suicide unless he’s real about this. I mean, this is a, and I’m telling you what’s happening is his album right now, Forbes projects it to me, the number one selling album during the month of November. This’ll be his ninth album. We’re going to find out just a couple of days here. This will be his ninth consecutive album to debut at the top of the billboard charts. Wow. He does not avoid controversy. Now let me tell you this, Virgil, the ancient Roman poet of the Augustine period said fortune favors the bold fortune favors the bold. Um, well, I don’t like virtual. Okay. Ah, let’s go with um, Steve jobs. He says, remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big decisions in life. Almost everything, all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure.

These things just fall away in the face of death, leaving behind only what is truly important. How often Jason, have you heard me talk about being dead soon? Um, actually quite a bit. What kind of things do I say about this? Oh man, I’m just, I, I’m, I always attribute it to how much you do and how the human body can only take so much. I think maybe that’s why you think you’re just kinda like evaporate one of these days. Well, the thing is, is that I, I’ve talked about this with all the time, is it remembering that I’m going to be dead soon is a great tool for me, right? I mean, what do I have to risk, right? If I’m Kanye West and I sincerely believe that Christ is the key to eternal life, what do you have to lose? You lose all your money.

Who cares? Plus that also gives you like a deadline. Like, look, if I want to get this done, I could be dead soon. I will be dead soon. So it’s a nice reminder of, Hey, clock’s ticking. You know, Aristotle, the famous a philosopher, he said, there’s only one way to avoid criticism. Do nothing. Say nothing. Yeah, and be nothing. Donald Trump says, I like thinking big. If you’re going to be thinking anything, you might as well think big. So Kanye is talking about moving to Wyoming to be able to spend more time with his family. Wow. What do I owe me? Apparently there’s less there. Ah, there’s no stars celebrity component. But this is, I mean this is, I’m just saying what happens Jason, if you are a pop star and you become a Christian, you want to share your faith, but you also don’t want to offend anybody. What happens? I mean, it’s a textbook catch 22 you can’t do that. Somebody is going to sell. It’s called Jesus is King. Harry has on the songs. Here he is on the Jimmy Kimmel show closed on Sunday and faith from the Oculus, New York city, Kanye West,

I mean over there.

So don’t let them and doctrine ne closed on Sunday. You’re my Chick-Filet. You’re my number one with the lemonade. Raise our sons, train the men, the faith, do temptations. Make sure they are vital away. Follow Jesus. Listen and know.

Now the thing about the way it works on billboards, when a song hits the top of the billboard charts, it then gets played on the radio. So if you are listening to this album and you’re like, I want this kind of music to be played on the radio, well you have to vote with your dollars, right? So you got to go to Kanye west.com today, which I have done. And you can buy the collector’s edition. It’s a blue LP, a blue vinyl. You can buy that for 25 bucks. Wow. And uh, you get a vinyl. Here we go. Now listen to what he just said. And then marinade on this for a second here. Thrive nation. Here we go.

No, no limit bought a culture. We no body slave.

Now here’s where he really doubles down. He gets look

crazy. Ended up from my homestead.

It’s my home.

Even if I take this, wait this day, I mean I’m

just telling you, if you are out there and you’re going, I don’t know if this guy’s a real Christian or not, that’s between him and him and God above. Um, I personally, I’m going to go on the record of saying I do believe he’s, he’s changed. He’s a different guy. But you might say, clay, you’re wrong. That’s fine. But I would say this is the, the teaching moment you have here is it history favors the bold [inaudible] Kanye in his Jesus is King. Album is the top of the billboard charts for the same reason that he was, uh, in the media for taking Taylor Swift’s trophy back in the day from her cause he thought that Beyonce should’ve won it. So I’m not saying that you have to agree with Kanye. I’m just saying to you is that history favors the bold and the best way to avoid criticism according to Aristotle is there’s only one way to avoid criticism.

Do nothing, say nothing and be nothing. Think about that for a second. So you want to hold your team accountable. That’s friction. Yup. You wanna make sure I’m saved. Files the right way. That’s friction. Absolutely. You want to do the group interview every week. Hey, why aren’t you doing a group interview for fully staffed, Jason? That causes, that’s a lot of friction for a lot of friction. You want to do some call recording for accountability that causes some friction. You want to go head to head and beat your competition. That causes some friction. You want to follow up on checklists, make sure they’re being used. That causes friction and you want to get your team to ask Google reviews. That causes friction. You want to call it. You want to get people to be on time for your meeting. That’s going to cause friction. You want people to follow the actual sales script that’s going to cause friction.

You want everybody who works for your bakery to make cookies the same way, using the same recipe. That’s going to cause friction. You want everyone at Chick-Filet to say, it’s my pleasure. That’s going to cause some friction. You want to tell the world that you have a new faith and you want them to hear it. That’s going to cause some friction. That’s an if you fear friction, your life is just going to be your success life. Your future success is just going to be a fiction. I know that any further I do or reminding you, history favors the bolt through three, two, one boom.